Coorg Beef Curry

There are days when I feel like leaving all and just running away. Aren’t their days when we all feel like that? At times, the determination is sky high – that I am going to overcome everything, come what may be, while some days are just the opposite – everything feels like a deck of cards! I have this habit of sitting in the dark once the whole house goes to sleep, with the dim light in the passage on and the whole house silent. Somehow, Azza does not like me sitting alone, so she came and disturbed my silence the other night. Irritated, I commented, “I am going to put both of you at a school back home. You people go and stay with uppa and umma (my parents)” Initially, she looked excited and in a matter of seconds, she coiled down onto my lap and stayed silent. Understanding that my statement must have put her in a dicey situation, I asked her, “You don’t want to go?” She said, “Ummi, I want to, but what will you do?” That got me thinking. As soon as we become mothers, one part ceases to exist. We convert ourselves from a free soul to a soul with some dependants. As much as I crave for some me-time, a part of me feels really guilty of leaving the kids alone. The only me-time I have is in the office, so to say. Once I am out, my head is only whispering to be home as soon as possible. Even though I steal in around 15 minutes before I pick up the kids from their babysit, I still want them back home at the soonest. And as soon as they are in and they get to their boisterous best, I am wondering, “Ya Allah, why did I pick them up so early?” 😀 Sometimes, it just takes a deep breath and an assurance to yourself that everything is going to be fine… 🙂

Sharing with you today, a very easy beef curry, without much effort! Normally when I see recipes from cookbooks, I do a google search just to see similar recipes. This recipe is from Chef Noushad’s cookbook. While googling, I couldn’t find any curry called “Coorg Beef Curry”, which was kind of disappointing since I was looking forward to seeing a few of them. It turns out that normally Coorg curries are made of other meat which is haraam for us and there were a couple of chicken based recipes which was quite different from the one in the book. So I don’t say that this curry is authentic, but I went by the book and made it. Firstly, the beef is marinated in some spices and then mixed into a lovely ground sauce and cooked till done. Just to let you know that poppy seeds (around a tbsp) is a part of the ground paste, but I didn’t use it since I don’t get it here. So if you have it, you can use it. There is very little oil going into this curry, which is a plus point. It is totally cooked in the meat stock and that just adds on to the taste. If you are in a mood for something quick yet tasting amazing, then do try it… It just goes so well with chapathis and porottas!

So simple yet so gorgeous!
We can’t get poppy seeds here in Nepal either so I usually substitute ground cashews in dishes with coconut or almonds in dishes with curd, they both work well to thicken the gravy & add a bit of nutty flavor.

Even I would be the same! Just yesterday they were out for an hour and I was so jittery, but once they were back, all the vedimarunnus started… hehe… There is no liquid, it is all beef stock. If you want more curry, feel free to add a little water before pressure cooking…